Strange True Stories of Louisiana eBook

To impute moral sublimity to a white man and a quadroon
woman at one and the same time and in one and the
same affair was something beyond the powers of Camille’s
small soul. But he gave Attalie, on the instant,
full credit, over credit it may be, and felt a momentary
thrill of spiritual contagion that he had scarcely
known before in all his days. He uttered not
a sound; but for all that he said within himself, drawing
his breath in through his clenched teeth, and tightening
his fists till they trembled, “Oho-o!—­Aha!—­No
wonder you postponed the writing of your will day
by day, month by month, year in and year out!
But you shall see, my fine Michie White man—­dead
as you are, you shall see—­you’ll see
if you shan’t!—­she shall have the
money, little or much! Unless there are heirs
she shall have every picayune of it!” Almost
as quickly as it had flashed up, the faint flicker
of moral feeling died out; yet the resolution remained.
He was going to “beat” a dead white man.

IV.

PROXY.

Camille glided to the woman’s side and laid
a gentle yet commanding touch upon her.

“I must make haste to fulfill the oft-repeated
request of my friend here.”

“Your friend!” She still knelt,
and held the hand, but turned her face, full of pained
resentment, upon the speaker behind her. He was
calm.

“Our friend; yes, this man here. You did
not know that I was his secret confidential adviser?
Well, that was all right; I told him to tell no one.
But now I must carry out his instructions. Madame
Brouillard, this man wished to leave you every cent
he had in the world.”

Attalie slowly laid her lips on the big cold hand
lying in her two hot ones and let the silent tears
wet all three. Camille spoke on to her averted
form:

“He may never have told you so till to-day,
but he has often told me. ’I tell you,
Camille,’ he used to say, ’because I can
trust you: I can’t trust a white man in
a matter like this.’ He told you? Yes;
then you know that I speak the truth. But one
thing you did not know; that this intention of his
was the result of my earnest advice.—­Stop!
Madame Brouillard—­if you please—­we
have no time for amazement or questions now; and less
than none for expressions of gratitude. Listen
to me. You know he was always afraid he would
die some day suddenly? Yes, of course; everybody
knew that. One night—­our meetings were
invariably at night—­he said to me, ’Camille,
my dear friend, if I should go all of a sudden some
day before I write that will, you know what to do.’
Those were his exact words: ‘Camille, my
dear friend, you know what to do.’”
All this was said to the back of Attalie’s head
and neck; but now the speaker touched her with one
finger: “Madame, are your lodgers all up
town?”